Simply A Masterpiece

Memorable, crazy movie

As Good As It Gets

This is a coming of age storyline that you've seen in one form or another for decades. It takes a truly unique voice to make yet another one worth watching.

It starts off a bit uninteresting until you get to the dinner part. Maybe I've met too many people who struggle in those problems, maybe my life is broken down by all those characters in only one person... don't know what it was. Its not like I haven't heard those messages before, but for every doubt, every question, every fear that I battled watching a movie made me understand it better than listening to others tell me. Nothing in this movie is controversial to the Bible, nothing is what I haven't heard before. Difference is, when you have a visual of what you already know, it's almost like you can picture it for your life as well. The abuse in childhood with inability to forgive, the embarrassment of my poverty, the pride in my riches, the religious attitude, the atheism, the desperate search for love, the despising of a spouse, the lack of leadership and the desire to know God and recognizing Him. It took me 5 hours to watch this movie as Jesus spoke to each problem and it almost felt like he was saying it to me and I would break down in tears and had to compose myself and keep watching. It fills you with hope, truth, biblical wisdom and fear of the Lord. Wish they had more of these.

As somewhat of an Agnostic who have nothing against Christian movies on principal, I still found this to be a offensively bad, poorly made and biased propaganda piece that did the complete opposite of what it tried to do.The film centers around a small group of different people who find themselves on a forest road in the middle of nowhere, only to find that the main road they are traveling has been closed down due to a storm. Instead they all detour to a side road to find a diner to take shelter in, only to find out that the guy owning it is in fact Jesus. Then he starts to grill them about their hidden dark pasts in an attempt to rekindle their faith.Now this concept in of itself could maybe have worked if it was played subtly. For example, if it was left ambiguous whether or not this man is truly Jesus or not. Perhaps have the protagonists open up about themselves in believable ways by their own will to create an actual on-screen relationship between them, and to give real weight to their decisions to change their ways. Instead, we have Jesus practically forcing his way into their minds and threatening them with eternal damnation, while acting like a straight up sociopathic serial killer and stalker.I can't stress this enough, this is the single worst portrayal of Jesus on film I have ever seen, even worse than Jesus Christ Vampire Hunter, and that portrayal was intended to be bad for the sake of comedy. He plays on people's pains and fears to manipulate them, going as far as to force a girl to forgive her sexually abusive dad with threats of eternal damnation and an awful future life, and literally demands the people in the diner to bend to his will. I thought Jesus was supposed to love everybody and ask people to love him back on their own free will?It doesn't help that the protagonists in this movie are all bland stock characters with dull, lifeless acting bringing them to life either. We got our obligatory straw Atheist, the bickering couple contemplating divorce, the troubled girl who is losing her faith due to trauma and the born again Christian who is basically already in Jesus' good graces. But she is ordered to leave her boyfriend anyways because it amuses Jesus and because her boyfriend isn't Christian. None of them feel like real people except for the straw Atheist character, who surprisingly seem to act somewhat rationally to begin with outside of being a massive jerk, before eventually succumbing to the granary.Gluing this story of abuse and misquoting of religious text together is also some really shoddy technical work, that at times is at the levels of a home movie. Cheap stock thunder effects, tons of noticeable continuity errors, an obvious home camera that is carried by the camera operator most of the time, and a sound designer that thinks panning dialogue entirely to the left speaker is somehow a good idea. It looks and feels cheap and amateurish, even for a low budget production.In the end it's hard to even describe what happens in this movie, because it is just really an hour and a half of incredibly uncomfortable or ridiculous interviews with paper thin characters being interrogated by some sort of being claiming to be Jesus. Quite frankly, if it wasn't for the fact that Satan appears in the movie towards the end (named DeVille, because it's that sort of movie) I would have expected the big final twist to be that this is Satan pretending to be Jesus or something.At the end of the day, the movie is terrible not because it is Christian, but because it's a movie that tries to scare non believers and people like me, who find themselves caught between camps, to repent. Hell, the film itself states this outright. As such, it not only ends up as an absolutely dreadful viewing experience (unless you riff it the entire time), but also a disservice to religion as a whole. It unknowingly paints Christianity as an evil force that is only marginally better than the alleged damnation you would face otherwise, rather than the positive force in somebody's life it's intended to be.The only positive thing I have to say about this is that it is at least not A Little Piece of Heaven with Kirk Cameron.

First of all I find it unsettling that there are some who attack people's ratings of this movie because of a failure to meet a cinematic standard they want to see in a movie or others beliefs as Christians. We're suppose to rate the movie, not peoples ratings or their beliefs.This is a low budget film, of course it's not going to be on the same level as a major Hollywood blockbuster. But what it lacks in that is made up in the content of the film. The actors chosen for this film are perfect for their roles. What I enjoyed about The Encounter is the reality of Jesus who knows everybody and how he intervenes and reaches out even when they don't know he is there. The concept of meeting him at a diner I found to be brilliant, making him personable and real. It's put a fresh new perspective of him in my life and how simple it is to reach out back to him.This is a different Christian movie than most others and really refreshing. It really showed the reality of the choices we are faced with and the consequences, both good and bad of those choices, and the constant battle between good and evil.If you're a Christian, you'll love this movie, if you're not, it's definitely worth giving it a chance because believe it or not, this movie shows a real side of Jesus you won't find anywhere else. It succeeds in showing how real and approachable Jesus really is. There are much worse things you could waste your time watching.I would have given it a 10 except that there were times the camera shook, like the camera man either moved the tripod or the shot was hand held. Even for a low budget film, camera shake is really not acceptable.

The Encounter is a nice piece of independent Christian cinema. It doesn't star Sir Lawrence Olivier or boast a cast of thousands. The low budget production values clearly show but they don't distract. The cast is not sterling and the script could have used another draft or two. Still, the movie was decent and thoughtful and generally enjoyable.There isn't any violence or obscenity or sex in it. That's a welcome relief these days. You can actually sit down and watch it with the kids and not cringe.If you like a quiet Christian movie that will leave you feeling good and slightly more humble, this should fit the bill nicely.